The Big Think Team

Stephen Rodriguez serves as Big Think Capital’s VP of Specialty Lending, a role that he assumed in January of 2021. Stephen was brought on to develop all aspects of the organization’s SBA lending, equipment financing, ABL, and commercial real estate lending divisions. Combining his extensive knowledge and experience in each of these verticals with Big Think Capital’s marketing capabilities has made for the perfect pairing.

Throughout Stephen’s extensive career, he has established a reputation as an entrepreneurial Senior Executive who provides strategic leadership, proven sales management experience, and effective talent development strategies to build winning teams. His expertise encompasses all aspects of business development and administration, from sales forecasting and business planning, budget management, and sales execution, to harnessing team strengths for continuous improvement of company-wide performance. Further, his ability to build consensus among executive teams and stakeholders by promoting transparency through regulatory compliance, while inspiring positive change, has been repeatedly demonstrated.

Stephen gained his introduction to the lending industry during his tenure as a Senior Loan Officer for a Long Island based mortgage bank at the peak of the refi boom in the early 2000’s. He had quickly earned his way to becoming the top producer within his first 6 months at the company, which was later followed by a promotion to Assistant Sales Manager. Just 1 year later, at the age of 24, he was heavily recruited by another mortgage broker to develop their inside sales team as their VP of Sales & Operations. While there, he rapidly elevated the overall sales volume by 300% by designing, directing, and executing a full scope expansion plan, which included all phases of recruiting, hiring, coaching, and supervising the sales and operations divisions. Stephen personally launched, managed, and expanded three separate businesses in the financial services sector. While he has spent most of his career assisting businesses in meeting their financing objectives, he also owned and operated a debt settlement company for over 12 years, which provided him with an in depth understanding of distressed credit resolution practices from a lender’s perspective.

Stephen enjoys spending time with his family, wife Heather, step-daughter Taylor, daughter Stevie, and son Maximus. He has been an active practitioner of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu for over 12 years.